Business was humming along in one of the longest economic expansions in U.S. history until Covid-19 brought it to a screeching halt. Many businesses were negatively impacted from the rapid shutdown of the country, even those we thought to be immune to effects of an economic crisis, such as the health-care industry struggled.

As a business owner, what can you do to ensure that you get off to a successful restart of your business as states reopen? I believe it starts with mindset, which is critical to success now more than ever. The amount of negative news and fear that has been instilled into the world can’t help but cause us some angst. We have all received an overwhelming amount of negative input, which can easily affect our beliefs. Unfortunately, our minds do not distinguish between constructive and destructive input.

Mindset is the foundation of all success, and we must ensure that we are programing our mindset for the future we desire. Whatever we allow into our minds occupies our thoughts and can cause stress and anxiety, preventing us from successfully restarting, growing, and sustaining our businesses. Fear can easily take over and keep us from the necessary steps to ensure our success moving forward.

Success can come to us if we intentionally adopt a positive mindset. We have the power within us to change what we believe is possible and that affects what becomes possible. I have met many individuals, including many business owners, who are allowing their past or the current conditions to determine their future. This is tantamount to driving your car looking in the rear-view mirror.

I recommend the following steps:

1. Stand guard at the door of your mind.
2. Avoid negative news outlets that stoke fear.
3. Pay attention to any negative self-talk that you may have become accustomed to repeating without thinking.
4. Counter negative self-talk with a positive mantra that you repeat twice a day.
5. Write down some positive supporting statements and repeat them daily.
6. Focus on the positive, not the negative, and feed and strengthen your mind every single day.
7. Ask yourself, what you are going to do on a regular basis, to improve your mindset.
8. Spend time with positive people and avoid negative doomsayers.

We can allow the recent business disruptions to affect our future, or we can take charge of our future success by coming up with a plan to move forward and create the future we want. Success will come to those who are determined to be successful and adopt a positive and purposeful mindset.

If you want to increase top-line revenue and bottom-line profit. Give me a call 503-312-3145 or email me at garyfurr@garyfurrconsulting.com

You can also visit my website at http://www.garyfurr@garyfurrconsulting.com

Listen to my podcast Turning Complexity into Simplicity®

Learn more on this topic, you can find the book, COVID Business Strategies for Small and Medium Enterprises, a collection of advice from a group of six business advisors and consultants across three continents and four countries who specialize in working with small and medium enterprises, available on Amazon.

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We have been experiencing some real disruption to the business environment for some time now, whether you are a business doing business overseas or a local business experiencing a reduction of business due to the outbreak of the Coronavirus in 2020.

Your banker is well aware of the current circumstances and how local and international business is being affected. Now would be a good time to proactively communicate with your banker and discuss how this pandemic is affecting your business and what is your plan moving forward to mitigate the disruption to your business and come out on the other side of this as healthy as possible.

Hopefully you have an already established healthy relationship with your banker so that contacting them won’t be unusual. In my research on bankers and what their best customers do well, proactive communication was very high on their list. (see: Make Your Banker Happy, available on Amazon) If you have not communicated with your banker in a while, now would be a good time to do so.

Many business owners tend to hunker down when business is struggling, afraid to deliver the bad news, but this is the exact opposite of what you need to be doing. It is good to remember that bankers take bad news well and take no news poorly. Take the time to have an honest conversation with your banker on what is going well and what is not going well and come with a plan of action on how you will mitigate the impact of what is not going well. Doing so will set you apart from other businesses that are hoping that this will just go away soon, and business will return to normal.

Remember, your banker wants you to be successful, and they have a depth of experience, in good times and bad, and can most likely offer some guidance and assistance to help you navigate the storm. Be proactive and communicate with your banker. Don’t wait for him or her to call you.

If you want to learn more on this topic, you can find the book: Crisis Management for Small and Medium Enterprises, a collection of advice from a group of six business advisors and consultants across three continents and four countries who specialize in working with small and medium enterprises, available on Amazon.

Or reach out to me Gary Fur, call me 503-312-3145 or email me at garyfurr@garyfurrconsulting.com

You can also visit my website at http://www.garyfurr@garyfurrconsulting.com

Listen to my podcast Turning Complexity into Simplicity®

503-312-3145

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We have all had a couple of very challenging and interesting years with the onset of the Corona virus. We have seen a complete disruption to our lives, business, and the business supply chain.

It is important that we take the virus seriously but not to panic. We must be vigilant and extra careful especially if you are an older adult with underlining health issues.

I don’t want to downplay the seriousness of this pandemic, but it is important in times such as these that we are more creative, innovative, persistent, and resilient than ever before.

In Eric Greitens book entitled Resilience, he states “Resilience is a virtue that enables us to move through hardships and become better. None of us can escape pain, fear or suffering. Yet from pain can come wisdom, from fear can come courage, and from suffering can come strength, if we have the virtue of resilience.”

I am reminded of Viktor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning in which he described his experience in a Nazi concentration camp. While he didn’t have as much freedom as his captors, he determined that he had the freedom to choose his response to what was happening to him.

The greatest impact on us, and those around us, is not so much what happens to us, but our response to what happens to us and we have the freedom to choose our responses.

As I observe multiple businesses, some doing very well, some just surviving and many that have just gone away, I am reminded that the key to success has less to do with talent and skill set and more to do with persistence and resilience.

If we can deal with our problems and struggles correctly, they will make us not only stronger individuals but stronger organizations as well. Be vigilant, don’t be scared, remain calm, and take prudent caution, and this too will pass.

Our circle of control is actually very small, and while our circle of influence is somewhat larger than our circle of control, most things are outside both circles. Remain calm, breath, and focus on that which you can control, influence, and work on to make your organization stronger as a result.

If you want to learn more on this topic, you can find the book: Crisis Management for Small and Medium Enterprises, a collection of advice from a group of six business advisors and consultants across three continents and four countries who specialize in working with small and medium enterprises, available on Amazon.

Or reach out to me Gary Furr at:

garyfurr@garyfurrconsulting.com

www.garyfurrconsulting.com

503-312-3145

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